Something tells me that this is probably going to be the longest post that I’ve ever written, but that’s my fault because I’ve not had chance to post for a while.

Well first things first, I went to replace the scanner light on my car and decided to turn on the old one one last time before I disconnected it and to my surprise, it was working properly!!! How could a burnt out LED suddenly be working again?!? So, I decided to leave it on.

My good friend Tim just turned 21 recently. Of those 21 years, I’ve known him for 20 of them. He’s getting married to his fiancé Emma in July, and because that’s not far off he decided not to have a 21st. I’d only met Emma once or twice and only briefly, but a while ago she managed to steal my number off his phone and called me to say that she was organising a surprise 21st birthday meal for Tim. It was so nice of her to remember me and to invite me to it, not to mention how nice it was for her to organise the whole thing for Tim – she did a splendid job!

I had to travel to Leeds and I followed the directions that I got off the net and managed to get there with few problems. It was once I arrived there that the problems started to arise. I was looking for a turning and couldn’t see it anywhere, so I kept on going. And going. And still kept on going. After about 20 minutes I decided to stop and ask directions. Now I figure that of all the people to ask for directions, there are 3 types;

1. Taxi Drivers
2. Pizza Delivery
3. Psychics

One that narrowly makes the list is ‘escaped convicts’. You’d expect that criminals would know their territory well to hide from or get away from the police should something go wrong. However, they didn’t make the top 3 for 2 reasons;

1. If they are escaped convicts then that would suggest that they were eventually caught by the police, so therefore perhaps their knowledge of the area isn’t quite as good as it should be
2. I don’t want to die

So I looked around and there were no taxis anywhere. So I kept on looking. There was a couple of drunks walking down the street who looked like they could be psychotic, but certainly not psychic. Besides, I would have thought that if there were any psychics around that they would know I was looking for them and wave at me to stop. But fortunately, I found a pizza place that does deliveries and they could give me directions to Leeds. That’s right – not necessarily to the restaurant, but they could direct me back to Leeds. Apparently I’d gone all the way through Leeds, out the other side, and then through two more towns. Yeah, I was pretty lost.

So I arrive back in Leeds and I’m looking around and realising that I don’t recognise any of it. It turns out that Leeds has this huge one-way system and so I couldn’t find anything familiar. So naturally, I panicked like a little girl. I tried phoning Emma, but she didn’t reply – and seeing as she was with Tim and trying to keep the meal secret from him by pretending that they were just going for a quiet meal and drink together, I decided not to try again. Luckily I remembered one person who would be there whose mobile number I still had.

I called Ben.

Ben doesn’t know Leeds either. He didn’t even drive there. He was outside the restaurant but didn’t know where I was in relation to it. Neither did I. I didn’t know where I was in relation to anything, and after driving around Leeds for about half an hour I was starting to realise that I’d seen most of the city centre, but keeping track of where I’d been was starting to become a blur. I was beginning to think that all help was lost.

But then Ben told me to find the train station, as it’s only 5 minutes walk from the restaurant. Bingo!

Except all the signs pointed towards the airport. It was at this moment that a thought ran through my mind; “If only trains could fly then perhaps I’d find the restaurant”. Ironically at this moment I saw something miraculous! I’m sorry to dissapoint a lot of you, but it wasn’t a flying train (for that you’ll have to watch Back to the Future: Part III I’m afraid), but instead suddenly a sign appeared for the train station. And then there were road markings, and arrows, and I finally found it! Ben very kindly met me at the station and he directed me back to the restaurant.

Except Leeds is on a sodding one-way system!

We had to drive round about 3 or 4 times trying to find somewhere to park. Fortunately we did and we went for our meal. There were a few people from Culcheth (the villiage where I used to live) and everyone else was a stranger to me, but there was about 3, maybe 4 groups of people from various places, with 33 of us all together. When Tim arrived, you could see him walk in and perhaps notice one or two of us. And then he looked around and saw the other 30 odd people, and you could see in that moment him suddenly clicking – and it was then that I’ve never seen him look so shocked in his life! He couldn’t believe it!

Anyway, it was a fantastic meal and I’m so grateful for Emma inviting me to it – she really did do a fantastic job organising it all and the important thing is that Tim thoroughly enjoyed it.

After the meal, some people left and the rest of us went into town to go to a bar or club. We found one place in particular and Ben and myself, along with his girlfriend and someone else went in. To our left was a really crowded room, and to our right was a less crowded room, so naturally we went in there. Except no-one else from our group came in. We looked outside and they were all stood together in a group which we later found out was because Emma’s 17 year old brother couldn’t get past the bouncers. So we all left to join the group and as we left the less crowded room we walked past a woman near the door in a uniform saying to some random couple “I’m sorry but this room is for members only, you’ll have to go to the other one if you’d like a drink”. Hehe yeah, we’d managed to sneak into the members only room – which explains why it was quite quiet and had a nicer atmosphere.

We eventually went to a place called Squares. It was quite a good place and in the center is a wide open space suitable for people to dance. Now I say “suitable” in the lightest sense of the word because due to a heavy reason, I wouldn’t call it suitable. Above the dance floor is the largest, biggest block you’ve ever seen. Underneath are lots of square mirrors, and the sides are made up of 16 television screens per side (at least) and the whole unit revolves in a circle. Now surely something that big, and that heavy, must cause a strain on the ceiling and whatever is supporting the weight may at some point get weak. I’d imagine that they’d hire a janitor to regularly tighten it up – but personally, I wouldn’t want to be dancing underneath it on the janitor’s day off….

The weirdest thing about that pub though was watching Tim’s 17-year-old brother Geoff drinking beer. I’ve known this guy since he was a kid, and both Tim and myself just considered seeing Geoff drinking to be…. very very wrong!

At the end of the night I went back to Tims house to stay there overnight with him and Luke and Jane. Luke is one of the guys from Culcheth who I know, and Jane is his fiancé who I hadn’t met until the meal. They’re both great people and they’re getting married shortly after Tim and Emma. The main reason I had to stay over is that I had to go home on the M60 – but that night of all nights, it was being closed due to road works.

The following morning there was a road that I had to leave on (the name of which escapes me now, but I think it was the A627) and Luke and Jane had to leave on that road aswell – so they told me to follow them onto the road and they’d help put me on the track to getting back home. Just as we were all saying our goodbyes, Jane said to me “…and we’ll see you at the wedding”.

Before I continue, there’s something I should make clear. Tim and Emma are getting married soon. Luke and Jane are getting married soon. My friends Jo and Jim recently announced that they’re engaged and so at some point they’ll be getting married. I have another friend who’s planning on proposing to his girlfriend when the time is right. Pretty much everyone I know right now is either married, engaged, or in a long term relationship that looks like it could easily end up leading to an engagement. In fact, Dave and I are the only single people around my age that are still single. So with all these weddings and certainly on that weekend there was a lot of talks about weddings that it’s hard to keep track of which wedding is which.

So when Jane said “…and we’ll see you at the wedding” I replied in surprise with “Oh! Oh right, well thank you…” to which she followed up with “At Tim & Emma’s wedding!” Awkwardness ensued. I’d mistaken it as an invitation to their wedding, which surprised me having known her for less than 24 hours but I thanked her because I didn’t know what else to say. Obviously I’m not invited to their wedding but I’d just gotten confused momentarily, lol. Oops.

So I followed them onto the A627 (or whatever it’s called) and proceeded my journey home. After a while we got into countryside – something which I hadn’t seen on my way over. Now the main problem is that I didn’t have a map book with me – I’d left that at home. I quickly looked at the directions I’d printed off at Tims house and was constantly looking for a road name. When I realised that I should have made a turning about half an hour earlier, I suddenly realised what I’d done.

I was on the right road but going in the wrong sodding direction!

So I had to drive all the way back to Tim’s house and start again from scratch. Fortunately I managed to find the route home okay at that point.

The following day I had to go to my grandparents house because I’d repaired their computer but they were having problems connecting to the internet so I offered to go back. Now for those of you that remember, I learned about motorways the hard way when I struggled to fully understand junctions. Well let’s just say that I’ve discovered a new problem.

So I was on my way to my grandparents house in Chadderton near Manchester. I drive from my home in Congleton, South Cheshire and continue my way there hoping to arrive at 11am. I reach the M60 and proceed to drive onto it, knowing that there’ll be a while before I get to the junction that I need to exit onto. After a while I went under a bridge that didn’t seem familiar, but I decided to think nothing of it. Then there were other landmarks that I was sure that I should have passed by then. Eventually I did and I took the first familiar exit I saw at bang-on 11am. But what’s wrong with this picture? I looked at the road sign for Chadderton. It didn’t say Chadderton.

It said Congleton.

I’d only gone round the entire M60 in the wrong direction and started heading back towards Congleton!!! I called my Grandpa and ended up back on track and went to their house and fixed everything that needed to be fixed. Except I found that something else was broken – my scanner light had two LEDs that weren’t working, this time on the opposite side to the other one. They didn’t seem to be working at all with no way of fixing them which leaves me to believe that perhaps the circuitry did in fact get damaged slightly when Tilt was involved in the accident. So I installed the new one which isn’t as good because it’s not as smooth as the old light, but it works which is the main thing.

Later that evening I went to the theatre for a reading for the next show entitled ‘Wait Until Dark‘ and in a few days time I’ll be auditioning for a couple of parts so I’ll keep you informed about that.

At the reading I met with the person who’s organising the One Act Play festival for which I’ve submitted my own script. Apparently there are 21 entries altogether which is 10 less than last year. It shouldn’t be long before they organise a reading to decide which of those 21 make the final cut to be performed, so again I’ll keep you updated on that as soon as I get more information. I’ve decided that if I win the One Act Play festival that I’ll will put the prize money towards buying a new scanner light.

Tonight is Valentines Day night and just as every year it’s a lonely one for me; I’ve never even received a card in my life, ever. But on the bright side, I’m hoping to move out of Congleton at some point and so not being in a relationship right now at least doesn’t restrict where I move out to. Anyways, I hope that you’ve all had a good valentines day, whether you’re married, engaged, looking to get engaged, in a long term relationship, in a short term relationship, in a relationship that’s so new you’re still not sure whether to class it as a relationship yet, or if you’re either just too young to be in a relationship or if you’re currently single like Dave & myself, which if you are, you can at least be glad that at least you’re not going to go broke in the course of 24 hours.

That is, of course, assuming that you don’t find yourself instead travelling for hours on the motorway in the wrong direction – that kind of fuel can cost a lot!

And I was right… this is the longest post I’ve ever made. I don’t think I could make it any longer even if I printed it out on a giant-sized piece of easily stretchable rubber, attaching both ends to a couple of horses and forcing them to run in opposite directions. Unless I keep blabbering on like this. Yeah, this certainly adds to the length. Hmm… BIG GIANT CARCASES OF INFLATABLE DRAGONS INTERTWINED WITH CANCEROUS UNICORNS OF UNIMAGINABLE PROPORTIONS FIGHTING TO THE DEATH FOR THE LOVE OF A BEAUTIFUL PRINCESS CALLED GERTRUDE, ONE FIGHTING WITH FIRE BREATH, THE OTHER WITH HIS POINTY UNICORN HORN UNTIL ONE SUBMITS AND AGREES TO A LIFETIME OF BEING FORCED TO WATCH RE-RUNS OF BIG BROTHER!

Yeah, that should do it. Mmmmmmm, honey sandwiches.